


Together

by roxyeisen



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-22
Updated: 2018-03-22
Packaged: 2019-04-06 11:20:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14055831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roxyeisen/pseuds/roxyeisen
Summary: The missing scene from the end of My Struggle the Finale. The scene I really needed. If you also needed it, this is for you.*I just need to say, if that was the end of Mulder and Scully forever, then I have a big problem. That's not fair to them or to any of us to leave it like that. Now, I can see it as the end of the X-Files. This is a new beginning. And I think it could be more about William now. But I need to see Mulder and Scully find resolution, even if they are just their son's (you heard me, their son's) supporting characters.





	Together

“We need a room,” Mulder says to the half-asleep motel desk clerk. I don’t blame him. It’s 5:54 a.m. My body craves sleep. I want to sleep and never wake up. But I must. I must keep going. For our child.

We’re given a key to our motel room. I’m so weary I don’t care that the wallpaper is peeling and the room smells like someone was trying to clean up a murder scene.

Maybe it’s us that smell like that.

Mulder heads straight for the shower. I sink into a chair right out of 1993 and cover my face with my hands. I don’t move until he comes back, clad in only a towel. He goes to the plastic bag of clothes we bought on our way from the hospital. He dons a pair of black sweatpants and a t-shirt. Then he sits on the bed near my chair. 

We’re quiet for many minutes, ticked away by the old clock on the wall.

“How long have you known?” He finally breaks the heavy silence.

I heave a deep sigh, gathering my courage to talk about what I still can’t believe. “Hours. It didn't occur to me why I'd been so fatigued. You know I had a doctor's appointment last week. But when I was at your house, the doctor called with my blood test results.”

He nods. Takes it in. I wonder what he’s thinking, but at the same time I don’t want to take on the burden. My own swirling thoughts are too much to carry.

He seems to know it’s not the time for words. He reaches a hand to me, and I give it. He helps me stand and takes off my coat. I slip off my shoes and we lay down in the bed together. We both fall asleep immediately, and we sleep like the dead.

So many dead.

When I wake, the sun is high in the sky. Sounds of movement and laughter outside assault my ears. How can they all just go on with life as if nothing has happened? 

_My son is dead._ The thought won't settle in my brain. It flits around, uncomfortable, unable to find a place to rest. 

I reacted badly to Skinner's confession. I don't really believe the things I said to Mulder last night. I was William's mother, of course. It was just the thought of having that man do something to me against my will and without my knowledge ... I felt violated. I needed distance. I felt like he'd stolen something precious from Mulder and me. Something we'd always believed we shared, but it turned out we didn't. But what if he was lying? When has he ever told the truth? Does the timing even make sense? I feel a sense of dread. Dread of deciding what happens next. Of having no choice in the way things will play out.

His cell phone rings, startling Mulder awake. He reaches for it and answers in a husky, sleep-laden voice. He mostly listens before he ends the call. “Skinner is still in ICU and critical.”

I close my eyes tightly against the pain swelling in my chest. I think of Monica, who died trying to protect William. "Do you think he’ll make it?”

He doesn’t answer immediately. “I don’t know. I just don't know. About anything.”

I don’t, either. And I don’t want to discuss it.

Mulder’s arms go around me and his hands rest on my lower abdomen. I know what he is thinking. _How did this miracle happen? Is this another experiment? Am I really a father?_

The doubts plague me once again. Was I ever a mother? Was William simply a product of an evil man’s science? Have I spent the past seventeen years loving a boy who was never really mine in the first place?

“Scully, I can’t help but think he gave his life for us,” Mulder says as he seems to read my mind. “Even if the dark was chasing at his heels, he was a good kid. And we both saw the DNA results. Even if it turns out he's not mine, he _is_ yours.”

I can’t take the pressure building up inside me. I give in to the tears. I turn toward him and he holds me to his chest. 

I mourn him. I mourn the boy I thought was our son for so long. I mourn my child. All the emotions I was too shocked and disillusioned to process the night before come crashing down on me now.

When my tears are spent, he holds my face between his hands. Kisses me with the softest kiss. “I don’t have any proof, but I wouldn’t be so quick to believe that man’s claims. He’s always been a liar." Mulder's eyes go to the window. I see that rare vulnerability again. Mulder is always so stoic. I had no idea the depth of feeling he had for William. I'm touched by it. "I don't know how to explain it, Scully. I just can't get around my feeling that William was my son.”

"His body was never found," I say, a new thought occurring to me.

Mulder nods. "I've considered it, too. He was a special kid. If anyone can survive that gunshot, it's him."

Hope lights in my mother's heart like the candles we lit only the week before, as symbols of prayers. "Do you remember what I whispered in your ear, Mulder? At the church?"

He nods. "You said we were going to prove William was our son, once and for all. We were going to find him."

"I think I still believe that." I marvel at the thought. "And we have the DNA. We can put to rest the question."

A smile pulls at the corner of his mouth and crinkles the corners of his beloved eyes. My hand goes to his cheek, scratchy with stubble. 

"The question of what?"

"How many children you have," I say with a small shrug.

"I would like to know." He sighs. Kisses me again. Presses his forehead against mine. “We’re going to get through this, Scully. We’re going to get through it together. Come what may.”

I don’t completely trust my son. And I don’t trust that darkness has been defeated, even though the body of the Smoking Man was pulled from the river and zipped into a body bag. I don’t know for sure that the life growing within me is a miracle and not a menace. 

But I do trust Mulder. I will take his hope and cling to it. I’ll stay by his side and walk through this as we have walked through everything else.

Believing in the truth. Together.

"By the way," he whispers. "If you think we're ever going to live apart again, you're wrong. From this moment forward, we stay together. All three of us. And we stay out of the darkness. As far away as we can get. This little one is going to have a normal life. I'm going to make sure of it."

I don't have a single problem with that.


End file.
